Night Touch
by Sophia Jirafe
Summary: Intimacy is a narrow path


NIGHT TOUCH   
  
Author: Sophia Jirafe  
Classification: VA, R for sexual situations  
Summary: Intimacy is a narrow path.   
Spoilers: Orison, Theef, En Ami. A seventh season   
mindset is helpful.  
Archive: Freely. A note would be nice.   
Disclaimer: When I can surf, I'll claim them as mine.   
Don't hold your breath.  
Feedback: Yes, please. skepticgirl@yahoo.com  
Endless thanks to: The gracious and kind Jintian, for the   
beta that completes me.  
  
*************  
  
She thinks that maybe if she just curls herself up tightly   
enough he'll forget she's there. Perhaps the cool sheets   
will render her invisible, or the firm mattress open into   
a woman-shaped crevasse leading straight to the rocky bowels   
of the earth. Or maybe she'll just go sit in the bathroom   
until he falls asleep, then creep silently back to bed and   
position herself as far from his body as she can get.  
  
Maybe he just won't be in the mood tonight.  
  
She tenses, measuring the heat emanating from his still form,   
smelling him cautiously, trying to determine his intentions   
from the rhythm of his breathing. It's slow, deep, and calm.   
He lies on his back as usual, taking up most of her small bed,   
legs spread wide and arms at his sides. She contemplates   
turning over to see if his face has smoothed out into the mask   
of sleep, that false peace that comes over him with the night,   
whatever dark dreams lurk behind twitching eyelids. He sleeps   
lightly, though, and even her slight movements might pull him   
from the thin veil of slumber that she hopes has fallen over him.   
She doesn't want that.  
  
Instead she makes a valiant attempt at being both relaxed and   
vigilant, willing her body to sleep and her mind to guard   
against any surprise attacks. Two nights ago he caught her in   
the twilight of consciousness, too sleepy to resist warm strong   
hands reaching beneath the thin satin of her nightgown. Tonight   
she's wearing rough cotton pajamas, buttoned up tight. It will   
take more than pushing up her slip to get past her defenses now.  
  
She probably should have told him how she felt months ago, when this   
heavy malaise started. The instant she began to hate the loving   
weight of his prisoning hands, she should have looked into his   
eyes with tenderness, and told him she was going to go crazy if   
he didn't stop touching her. That their first heady kisses have   
turned to mundane obligation. That he's had her heart and soul   
for years--now she wants her body back.  
  
This isn't healthy, she remembers. She knows, with the part of  
her mind that still thinks rationally, that protecting herself from   
love is not the action of a normal woman. Swathing herself in cloth   
and a don't-touch-me aura are not the most effective ways to deal   
with a problem. She's thirty-five, not thirteen.  
  
None of this deters her from lying on the extreme edge of the   
bed and praying to God or whoever she believes in this week   
that he won't wake up, won't want her, won't expect her to love   
him for the muscles of his body and the warmth of his kisses   
and the way he snuffles "I love you" into her sensitive ear   
just after groaning and trembling and just before collapsing   
into oblivion.   
  
This is the eleventh stupid thing that smart women do to mess   
up their lives--sex in exchange for intimacy. Twelve: Endurance   
for security. Thirteen: Silence in the hope that he'll notice.   
Or maybe they're just the stupid things she does to mess up her   
lurching, patched-up hurricane of a life.  
  
He stirs.  
  
She grits her teeth, feeling cold anticipation move through her  
tensed muscles, fearful blood flowing witlessly in her veins,   
seeking a place to hide. Please no. Don't let me have to tell   
him tonight. Let the pain wait until I can see him in the light.   
I refuse to make the refusal now.  
  
He places his hand on her calf, just below her knee, squeezing   
gently. She feels dead and cold. The hand slides its way slowly   
up her leg, grazing her outer thigh, setting the hairs on end.   
She's ticklish, cruelly so, but does her best to quell the electric   
shivers that threaten to betray her. He rests his hand on her hip,   
holding the curves he knows so well. She wills him to roll over and   
go back to sleep. Or leave the hand where it is, it doesn't matter--  
just stop now. Don't make me hurt you.  
  
With passionate swiftness, he molds the whole overwhelming length of   
his body around hers; bony knees against her legs, arm wrapped tight   
around her waist, heavy hot breath in her hair, his groin warm and   
fierce against her. He first rubs the top of her thigh, then   
brushes upwards, over her soft flat stomach to cup around her left   
breast. He tightens the hold, brushing a thumb over the rebellious   
nipple that hardens beneath the cloth of her pajamas. He makes a   
shallow, quick thrust against her, as if showing final proof of his   
desire. She thinks she's going to be sick.  
  
"I know you're awake," he whispers, the raspy tone of it setting her   
teeth on edge. "You were so tired before--did you wait for me?"  
  
She's going to cry. She isn't ready to tell him the truth, that if   
staying up all night would have kept him asleep, she would have done   
it. She can't nod either, without hating herself. She remains still,   
even though she knows silence always means acquiescence with him.  
  
"I thought so," he whispers, and she knows he is smiling. His   
ministrations begin in earnest now, his hands slipping into their   
familiar routine of caresses, upper body first. He massages her left   
shoulder, then slides his hand back around to begin unbuttoning her   
shirt, slowly. She fights the urge to grasp his hand in protest. I love   
him. I love him. His lotion-soft fingers tiptoe in, drawing those light   
circles that she used to love on her stomach, her chest. He feathers   
her breasts, pinching her nipples lightly and briefly. He kneads,   
massages, caresses. She's afraid she's going to throw up or scream if   
he doesn't get his hands off her soon. She repeats her mantra of   
distraction. I love him. I love him.  
  
Instead of reading her mind, he pulls her gently onto her back,   
propping himself up on his elbow. She keeps her eyes closed, paper   
eyelids holding back a thin layer of tears. I love him. He pulls   
down at her waistband, taking pants and underwear at once. Tonight she   
has no excuse, no illness or early morning autopsy or sore muscles to   
keep him on his side of the bed. She never lies well, and especially   
not under the sweetest pressure imaginable. What woman on earth would   
dissemble in order to deny a lover like hers?  
  
Things are moving faster now, his mouth on various parts of her body a   
quick hot brush, leaving little moist patches that freeze her skin in   
the cool night air. A few seconds' suction on each breast, a slick   
trail dragged down to her pelvis, warm air breathed through the coarse   
hair there. She closes her eyes tightly against this hurried seduction,   
almost thankful for the rush. The quicker it starts, the quicker it   
ends. She braces herself as he parts her thighs, fearing this intimacy.  
  
A tiny miracle--he plants a quick kiss on her soft unfeeling flesh,   
just enough to remind her of what it felt like to desire this   
man, then moves away in order to get the show going. He takes down his   
boxers, pulling them with sudden grace over his feet, then sits back   
for a moment. Even in her self-made darkness, she knows what he's   
doing. It's an old, old habit of his--to rest on his heels for a   
moment, displaying himself before beginning his performance. In a young   
man it would have been endearing. In him it verges on insufferable,   
stayed only by the fact that she believes he is unaware that he does   
it.  
  
Her eyes should be open for this next part, but she keeps them closed,   
hoping that perhaps he will mistake her held breath and tense form for   
unbearable anticipation. He lies on her full-length, unknowing or   
unmindful of the fact that his weight presses her diaphragm until her   
breathing is thin and short. She feels him poking around between her   
legs, taking forever as usual to find the right spot. She knows what   
he's doing now--creasing his brow in frustration with her inconvenient   
anatomy. He should have found himself a tall Amazon. The warm, thick   
tip brushes her opening, and this is the moment where she should have   
taken him in her hands and guided him into her heart and soul, into   
love and ecstasy and bottomless bliss. She lies still for another   
minute, waiting for him to get it right, half-hoping he will fail and   
give up and go to sleep and in the morning be just her friendly partner   
with the lewd eye and raunchy jokes again.  
  
He pushes inside unexpectedly, the quick hard jolt almost enough to   
wrench a scream from her. She bites her tongue quickly; screaming three   
weeks ago brought a phone call from her long-suffering next door   
neighbor and two hours of cuddling, apologies, and weak tea.   
  
He knows how to proceed now--slowly, stretching her to accommodate the   
width of him. There's probably something medically wrong with her, that   
it takes so long to get past the initial pain of penetration, but she's   
never been with anyone even approaching his size. Besides, shoemakers'   
wives go barefoot, and doctors die young. Or is it doctors' wives? If   
so, why is she the one to suffer through what could be any one   
of a number of feminine, life-threatening ailments, so that he might   
have nightly pleasure and release? And why does she always start to   
think of logical arguments and proverbs and the dry cleaning she forgot   
yesterday, just as he begins in earnest?  
  
This isn't so bad. She can stand lying here, hands lightly on his   
shoulders, legs spread just wide enough, eyes shut tight, while   
something that should have been amazing goes on down *there*, in that   
place she hardly thinks of as hers anymore. Dull sex, she can take   
that. Stop at Sam's tomorrow, get the Jil Sanders suit and the heather   
grey DK pants. Oven cleaner--the pot roast last week wreaked havoc.   
Start filing the receipts from February. Worry about alien invasion.   
Tell Mulder you can't stand it when he touches you.  
  
It appears that something important is occurring in her nether regions.   
An explosion is imminent, judging from his short pants and soft grunts.   
The jackhammer pace is a dead giveaway too. She listens to him for a   
while, removed from herself for a moment, almost enjoying the   
secondhand pleasure she can feel in his body. The intensity increases,   
and she opens her eyes just in time to see his close, as his thrusts   
shudder too deep inside her. She bites her lip against the renewed pain.   
Not going to scream. His face is truly beautiful, more relaxed and   
abandoned than she ever sees it. She thinks for a moment that her love   
for him might be able to survive this physical revulsion, that if she   
were imprisoned with nothing but weekly visits separated by glass it   
would be the same as it used to be.  
  
A last harsh groan jolts out of him, and then he collapses as   
usual, his weight doubled by his limp relaxation. The silence   
in the room is a void. She wants him off of her, but knows she   
has to wait for the denouement, the finishing touch. A panting   
moment later, he struggles up to breathe his customary endearments   
into her indifferent ear. Then he rolls off sluggishly, curling   
into a ball that takes up most of the double bed. She lies still   
for a moment, counting. Forty-six, forty-seven. His snores come   
from nowhere, his hands clench convulsively, and his desired   
oblivion is upon him.  
  
For just a moment, she considers the idea that he loves her just   
as much as she lusts for him--that he puts up with love in exchange   
for pleasure, as she endures his touch in order to not be alone.  
Dark waters, dangerous thoughts. She doesn't want to wander there  
tonight.  
  
Tired doesn't describe the way she feels right now. If she were a   
darker person, she would say it was defeat. If she could bring   
herself to hate him, she would say she felt used. If she were insane,   
she might say she was happy.  
  
She's hungry.  
  
Knowing his slumber is at last tamperproof, she retrieves her scattered   
clothing, dressing with trembling fingers in the chill of the room. He   
has left the window open; Mulder, the human radiator. Without the   
proximity or desire of his body warmth she shuts it, letting the   
Georgetown night remain seen but not heard or felt. Without thinking   
she begins to straighten up the room, closing the dresser drawers he   
has left open, pushing in the desk chair he insists on pulling out,   
rearranging the knickknacks on her dressing table, the ones he always   
manages to bump and knock over. Her china elephant has had its poor   
trunk glued on three times this year.  
  
She exits through the bathroom, pausing to put on a panty liner and   
clean up a little with a cold washrag. She looks at herself in the   
mirror, her eyes huge and dark in the ghostly pale of her face. She   
looks like a waif, a street gamin, a child who has been hurt and   
doesn't understand why, but has become hard through the experience   
rather than vulnerable and frightened. She's looked this way for a   
long, long time.  
  
Her small bare feet make no noise on the cold, dusty floor as she walks   
to the dark kitchen. Lights seem to be her enemy tonight, and she   
avoids the refrigerator. She would rather not see anything clearly, not   
even last night's eggplant casserole. The wooden cabinets creak as she   
opens the doors one by one. Wheat Thins are an acceptable substitute for   
the piece missing from her soul. She pulls a store brand cola from the   
plastic circle connecting it to its five family members, then sits down   
in a kitchen table and begins to eat, leaving all the cabinet doors wide   
open. She's reckless tonight.  
  
If she thinks about it, really thinks about it, she can trace the whole   
mess back to the Case that Wasn't, three days in Atlantic City chasing   
phantom rollerbladers and personal demons in the aftermath of Donnie   
Pfaster. The case was an excuse to get out of town while prosecution talks   
rumbled through the stale echelons of the FBI. The rollerbladers were   
paid athletes promoting a new beachfront casinos. The demons were in her   
eyes, her hands, her hair, her mouth. She was afraid to close her eyes   
because of the instant replay behind her eyelids. Her hands trembled as   
she signed her name or brushed her teeth. There was a tiny wedge of   
hair snipped out of the back of her head. Sores burned at the raw,   
stretched-out corners of her lips.  
  
Mulder, her lover of one month, never stopped touching her. He rubbed   
her back in elevators, held her hand in the streets, massaged her   
shoulders at night, kissed her forehead whenever she came close to him.   
At the time, she felt that she could never have enough physical   
reassurance and love. Sleep was possible only with him curled behind   
her. She left the bathroom door open, shared the tiny shower with him,   
brushed her teeth with his hand on her back. Someone loved her.  
  
As they lay in her bed on their last morning in the hotel, the feeling   
first came over her. Stop touching me. She felt a crawling cramp down   
her spine, an urge to wriggle out of his arms and lay alone on   
cool hotel sheets. His body seemed stifling and too hot, like some   
giant blanket seeking to smother her. She felt him harden behind her,   
and a sickness rose in her throat. There was no comfort in his touch,  
only the remembrance of what such desire could bring. A bathtub full  
of cold water. Her beautiful candles turned menacing against her.  
That smile--God, that mad, evil, lusting smile. Pain. A gag and a gun.  
  
Two months is a long time to hate someone you're sleeping with, she   
thinks irrationally, knowing that it is not hate but saturation that   
drives her from his arms. If he would leave her alone for while, stop   
spending his evenings and nights in her home, stop leaving silly love   
notes taped to the dishwasher, stop coming up behind her and rubbing   
her arms up and down, up and down, while planting cold sticky kisses on   
the top of her head. If she could tell him that she doesn't want to be   
protected anymore, that she's had enough love. He was so pleased that  
she needed him in Atlantic City--why can't he see that that was an anomaly,  
a weekend of weakness? He's seen her without armor and thinks that was   
Dana, the girl who is really shy and vulnerable. Why doesn't he understand  
that Dana doesn't exist anymore?   
  
She tries to remember the last time she voluntarily touched him. In the   
hospital in San Francisco? Did she touch him them? She's so good at   
lying. She remembers that case, the way she bantered and flirted with   
him as if everything was fine, as if his hand on her back didn't make   
her want to duck and run. Maybe she wasn't lying. Agent Scully is   
allowed to flirt with Agent Mulder. It's lost Dana who doesn't want   
Mulder's hands on her ever again.  
  
She puts her head down on the table, resisting the urge to start   
hitting it, slowly and relentlessly banging sense into herself. He   
loves me. He loves touching me. I love him. She does not cry. That's   
already been done. It feels good to be cold. She closes her eyes,  
finding her own version of oblivion.  
  
In the grey March morning she finds herself back in her room, tucked   
warmly into the middle of the bed. She is alone. Somehow this is not   
comforting. The next stupid thing she does to mess up her life--  
she's never satisfied with anything she thinks she wants. She wishes   
she had someone to make her a pot of coffee. She wants him to get up   
and hand her her nice white terrycloth robe, and bring in the metro   
section of the paper. She wishes she'd woken up when he carried her to   
bed, because then maybe she could have mumbled a sleepy declaration of   
love, and maybe he would have smiled at her, and she would have   
remembered why she slept with him in the first place. Maybe she would   
no longer hear Donnie Pfaster's longing whine in his husky voice.   
Maybe she would have been able to kiss him.  
  
The bathroom tiles are cold, and in her lonely dawn she does not find   
this masochistically pleasant anymore. The white enamel sink is full of   
short brown hairs, the kind that will never really wash away. Mild   
irritation is born. Wet towels are crumpled up on the floor by the tub,   
amidst puddles of water. She frowns. She reaches over to turn on the   
hot water tap. As the room fills with steam, the mirror fogs over,   
revealing words scribbled on it: "I love you" She feels anger sweep   
from the pit of her stomach to the soles of her feet, then up to flood   
her face with color. Fuck him. He can buy the Windex.  
  
An hour later, she opens her front door, looking for her regular   
newspaper. Instead, she finds an article about a boy whose cancer was   
cured by guardian angels. It's time to be an investigator again, Dana.  
  
As she drives to work, she thinks that there is nothing in the world   
she wouldn't do to get away from him for a few days.  
  
***********  
  
rants and existential musings to skepticgirl@yahoo.com  
  
this and more at http://www.dreamwater.com/mcaact/maren.html  
  
  
  
  



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